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The United States and the Italian Elections of 1948”

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The United States and the Italian Elections of 1948” Taking Off the Gloves: The United States and the Italian Elections of 1948” JAMES E. MILLER American intervention in the Italian elections of 1948 was a turning point in the political history of postwar Italy and a watershed in the development of U.S. foreign policy. During the Italian crisis of 194743, the United States first experimented with its new national security mechanisms, mounted its first significant covert political operations, and drew conclusions about the best means for combating communism, which were to have a lasting effect on American political activities in Europe and the Third World. Although a number of studies have noted the importance of American intervention and a massive body of documentation has been available since the mid-l970s, no detailed scholarly study has appeared in either English or, more surprisingly, Italian. ‘ In early 1948 U.S. leaders feared that Western Europe was on the edge *This article was substantially written before the author joined the Historical Office of the U.S. Department of State and does not reflect the views of that agency. He would like to thank Robert McMahon, John Harper, Ronald Landa, Antonio Varsori, and Fynnette Eaton for their critical review of the manuscript. ‘Joyce and Gabriel Kolko, The Limits of Power (New York, 1972), pp. 378, 438-39; Richard Freeland, The Truman Doctrine and the Origins of McCarrhyism (New York, 1970), pp. 247, 268ff.; Lawrence Kaplan, “Toward the Brussels Pact,” Prologue 12 (Summer 1980): 73-86; Alan Platt and Robert Leonardi, “American Foreign Policy and the Postwar Italian Left.” Polirical Science Quarterly (Summer 1978): 197-215. Robert Divine, “The Cold War and the Election of 1948,” Journal of American Hisrory 59 (June 1972): 90ff., points to the effects that the events of the spring of 1948 had on American foreign policy and domestic politics. Memoirs and studies dealing with the origins of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) also have stressed the importance of the Italian experience to the subsequent development of the agency and its policies. See Tom Braden, “The Birth of the CIA,” American Heritage 28 (February 1977): 4-13; William Colby and Peter Forbath, Honorable Men (New York, 1978), pp. 109ff.; Ray Cline, Secrets, Spies, and Scholars (Washington, 1976), pp. 98-102; William Corson, The Armies of Ignorance (New York, 1977). pp. 295-302. For a discussion of Italian studies of the 1948 elections, see Antonio Varsori, “La Gran Bretagna e le elezioni politiche italiane del 18 aprile 1948,” Sroria conremporanea 13 (February 1982): 5-70. Two unpublished studies on the Italian elections also merit mention: Ernest E. Rossi, “The United States and the 1948 Italian Elections” (Ph.D. diss., University of Pittsburgh, 1964); and Ronald Landa, “The United States and the Italian National Elections of 1948” (1972). 35 36 DIPLOMATIC HISTORY of disaster. On 25 February the Communists seized power in Czechoslovakia. On 20 March the Soviet delegation walked out of four-power discussions in Berlin. At the same time, the Soviets were pressuring Finland to sign a defense pact. General Lucius D. Clay, U.S. commander in Germany, warned Washington that a Soviet military attack might occur within days. American leaders began to fear that a Communist victory in the 18 April elections would signal the collapse of democracy in Europe, while a Communist defeat might provoke Soviet military action. Clearly, a Communist victory would have major international implications, strengthening the bid for power of the Communist parties throughout Western Europe and correspondingly weaken- ing the ability of their moderate middle-class and Socialist opponents to resist. The United States would suffer a severe loss of prestige if a strategic nation within its sphere of influence moved into close collaboration with the Soviet Union. In Italy, the well-organized, disciplined, and financed Italian Communist party (PCI),allied with the militant Italian Socialist party (PSI), threatened to exploit popular discontent and sweep into power in free elections. These elections thus became an apocalyptic test of strength between communism and democracy for the leaders of the U.S. government. Italian-Americans and leaders of the Roman Catholic Church actively joined in the anti-Communist initiatives of the Truman administration. Millions of dollars secretly were funneled to the Christian Democratic and right-wing Socialist parties. A massive propaganda campaign mobilized Italian voters against the Communist- Socialist coalition. The United States laid contingency plans for a major military involvement in case of an Italian civil war and sent military advisers and equipment to Italy’s internal security forces. Economic assistance and the promise of prosperity through the Marshall Plan became a bludgeon, which the United States held against the Left. In collaboration with the government of Alcide De Gasperi and the Vatican, the United States succeeded in reducing the issues before the Italian people to a series of simple choices: democracy or totalitarianism, Christianity or atheism, America or the Soviet Union, abundance or starvation. The U.S. intervention in Italy’s internal affairs took place in three stages. In the first (January to May 1947), American policymakers decided to commit a greater share of U.S. economic resources and political prestige to the person and programs of De Gasperi, the leader of the Christian Democratic party (DC),in an effort to break the deadlock within the Italian government and to promote essential reforms. During the second stage (May to December 19471, De Gasperi responded to American promises of support by forcing the Left out of his government and instituting a stringent program of economic reform. The parties of the Left reacted with a growing campaign of violence that seemed to presage a civil war. The new national security mechanism of the United States coordinated its response to the threat of armed revolution and reinforced De Gasperi’s shaky political coalition. At the beginning of the final stage (January to April 1948), public opinion polls predicted a Communist TAKING OFF THE GLOVES 37 election victory, and the United States mounted an intensive and effective program of overt and covert action to defeat the Left. At the beginning of 1947 this country stood at a crossroads in its efforts to stabilize postwar Italy. Political reconstruction was proceeding successfully, but the failure of economic reconstruction programs financed by the United States seriously imperiled the future of Italy’s democratic regime. The govern- ment that De Gasperi had formed in July 1946 was an unsteady coalition. The three largest parties-PCI, PSI, and DC-were deadlocked on the major issues of reconstruction. As economic conditions worsened, popular discontent erupted into crippling strikes, politically motivated violence, revolts by bands of ex-partisans, and mass rallies and demonstrations.2 On 10 November 1946 the Christian Democrats were badly defeated in local elections in Rome. The economic aid that U.S. policymakers counted on to cool off this potentially revolutionary situation was too limited and arrived too late and too erratically to make significant headway against growing instability.’ In an influential memorandum of 21 November 1946, Walter Dowling, the Italian desk officer at the State Department, noted Italy’s increased instability. He urged the United States to abandon its hands-off approach to Italian internal affairs in order to defeat the PCI in national elections scheduled for May or June 1947. Dowling recommended that the U.S. government employ a judicious mixture of flattery, moral encouragement, and considerable economic aid, making itself “so damned pro-Italian that even the dumbest wop would sense the drift.”4 He also recommended that Prime Minister De Gasperi be invited to the United States in formal American recognition that Italy was once again a full member of the international community. This gesture, when combined with meetings with top American officials and a series of highly publicized economic concessions, would reinforce De Gasperi’s personal position, while underlining America’s concern for Italy. The prime minister was eager to confer with U.S. officials and to obtain a display of U.S. support for his regime, and he brought with him a long list of requests for economic assistance. His ten-day visit (5-15 January 1947) was a public relations triumph. De Gasperi enjoyed personal audiences with President Hany S Truman and lengthy meetings with outgoing Secretary of State James F. Byrnes and other top American officials as well as with prominent Italian-Americans, congressmen, and members of the Roman Catholic hierarchy. The American press greeted him warmly and endorsed ’See, for example, New York Times, 18 July, 28 August, 10 October 1946. ’James E. Miller, “The Search for Stability: An Interpretation of American Policy in Italy, 1943-46,” Journal of Italian History 1 (Autumn 1978): 264-86. 4Walter Dowling to H. Freeman Matthews, Washington, 21 November 1946, 865.00111- 2146, Record Group 59, Department of State, National Archives and Records Service, Washington (hereafter cited as NARS). Portions of this document were translated and published with a commentary in Ennio Di Nolfo, “Quando I’America passa la guida dell’anticommunismo dal Re a De Gasperi, Corriere della Sera (Milan), 20 July 1975. ’Dowling to Matthews, ibid. 38 DIPLOMATIC HISTORY increased aid to Italy. De Gasperi received a number of small but useful new grants of aid, and the State Department used the visit as leverage to force a $100 million Export-Import Bank loan to Italy from a reluctant National Advisory Committee on International Monetary and Financial Policy.6 The personal contacts that De Gasperi made with Truman, his chief advisers, and congressional leaders were equally important. The prime minis- ter’s talks with Republican senators Robert A. Taft and Arthur H. Vandenberg were especially crucial. Taft and Vandenberg told the Italian leader that a stable government which guaranteed that American aid would not be wasted and that American interests would be protected could count on U.S.
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